starting a family

A good start for you with regard to understanding the issues around being gay parents is Colage. It is from the child's perspective, but this is what is most important.

The other hurdle is deciding on who the sperm donor will be and a consideration of the legal issues, I would strongly urge you to learn about the legal ramifications and rights pertaining to the sperm donor before you even start looking for the source, as it were.

 

I don't have any wisdom to share with you, but I wanted to say good luck and I hope that your answers come to you quickly. Sending support and encouragement your way!

 

You said "once we are settled with jobs"--is relocating an option? I live in a city where it's not terribly uncommon for kids to have same sex parents and the political climate in general is very liberal and lgbt friendly. My kids (I'm currently in a het marriage with two kids) have two families in their regular circle of friends who are headed up by lesbian moms. They also have a friend who has lesbian grandmothers. And there's another couple made up of two men they've been around some who have two kids. They also had a transgender nanny for a while--they are too young to understand the concept of transgender--but they don't bat an eyelash at all manner of gender presentations. I'm currently in a heterosexual marriage and am in the process of getting divorced. Honestly the least of my worries right now is how they will handle having an openly gay mom--and the reason that is the case is largely because of where I live. I certainly understand that's not the case everywhere and for that reason fully intend to keep them here. Oh, and sometime within the last year I was in a coffee shop in the children's play area with my daughter and a girl who was school aged started talking to me and introduced me to her mother, and eventually she wanted to tell me something about her other mother and just paused to say "I have two moms" and then went on to tell me the rest of her story. She seemed very comfortable talking about her moms. She understood that people make assumptions about people having a mom and a dad but showed no nervousness or fear about explaining to me, a stranger, that she had two moms--which lead me to believe that she hasn't gotten much flack from people about having two moms. Anyway, consider location, and also I'm betting it would be valuable for your kids to have other kids in their social circle with same sex parents.

 

My kids have only found out I was gay in the last year or so (they're teenage girls). I'm not very public about it in our small town at the moment, but it's creeping out, and they've been very accepting and calm about it.

"Different" is a very relative term. If you bring up kids in a loving gay household, they will see that as completely normal, because what they really want is love, guidance and support. My kids have spent their lives in a straight family that had a lot of problems, and the prospect of Dad having a boyfriend who will eventually be their stepfather has been much less problematic for them than a lot of the other things going on in our household. If you're clear from the start, in terms they can understand, that all families are different--one parent or two, same-sex or opposite-sex parents--and bring them up with a sense of self-worth, they'll be able to face any possible heat they may encounter. And I say "possible" because it's quite possible that there won't be any at all. And if there is, a kid who is secure and happy can blow it off and ignore it. So focus on raising a strong, sensible and kind child, and things will be fine.

 

Soag, I just wrote about this in another thread, and it applies here too. I had my first and last serious gf when I was 23, I was the mother of three small children, all under 5 (i had a set of twins!) when my brother told me that being that we lived in a rural area that was not friendly, I would be causing pain and damage to my children by having them be known as the kids with the gay mom... I was told that they would be picked on, beat up, discriminated against when it came to party invites, etc. My brother made me feel as if I'd do irrepairable damage to my children, and being that I had seen a few 'out' men get beat up I took it to heart and threw myself back in that closet only dating men. I felt hollow and empty for years, that was 1997, I came back out last year and finally free, and ya know what? One of my daughters is lesbian I had known since she was very young but it took her a while to figure it out lol. I was open with my kids about who I was and that I had dated a girl at one point, because I had always hoped that I could get back to that place of being out...and I have. Children love you no matter what, my children love me. Kids deal with stuff either way, all three of my girls were bullied or picked on at one point or another for different little things, being overweight, being a bookworm, etc. You will do just fine, no one has a parenting manual, none of us get the secret play book, we all fly by the seat of our pants and do the best that we can with what we have. Btw, my twins are now 20, my oldest will be 23 next week and they are all functional members of society

 

That is awesome!

You could learn a lot from watching some of the documentaries about couples going through this. Although the couple has a lot of hardships that are worse than what most go through, if you can get a hold of The Real L Word series (on Netflix) there is a couple there that goes through all the different steps and scenarios to figure out how to get pregnant. The show is kind of ludicrous, especially as the seasons go on, but the storyline with that couple is actually really touching.

There are also a bunch of documentaries on lesbian couples deciding to have babies. Unfortunately my mind is blank right now about the names, but I've seen a bunch of them, including one that was about a lesbian couple who adopted kids who had different racial backgrounds from theirs. All of these people have overcome adversity, and have found a way to pursue their dream - and now that gay marriage is legal in more and more states (including NY), the situation will be even better for the future kids growing up in such families.

Do consider the legal ramifications though and get a good LGBT rights lawyer, if you decide to have the kids while not married. The woman who does not carry the baby faces many challenges legally to parenthood, even if the egg used is hers through surrogacy (which is not even legal in NY, but is in some other states). You have to make sure you are fully covered with the paperwork.

Remember though, no family is without drama and challenges, so your kids don't have to be at any disadvantage vs. other kids. If anything many kids growing up in same sex couple families have even more love and resources at their disposal, since their parents had to try so hard to have them and really thought about it ahead of time. I would recommend for anyone contemplating parenthood to take at least one parenting course beforehand, and to thoroughly discuss issues like discipline, religion, schools, and other issues that will come up in co-parenting children.

Good luck! I would love to be in your situation with a stable relationship and supportive partner and the life circumstances to make this a good time, so I hope you really enjoy it! Don't make it stressful, just focus on the love and your hopes for the future, while you are enjoying the present together.

 

I saw that there are some books on Amazon on the subject, which could be helpful. I have no experience to help you, only to say that I really hope it goes great for yall, and maybe one of the books on Amazon will be able to help you understand your options.